Jamel and Philippe Lacheau: “Marsu plays better than the two of us combined”

The Marsupilami returns. Not a sequel, not a remake, but a new adventure. Lacheau and Debbouze tell how they brought back to life the yellowest, fastest and funniest animal in French cinema.

At Alpe d’Huez, Jamel went through the festival like a tornado: jokes galore, uncontrollable energy, and a Marsupilami shouted in every corridor. On stage with Philippe Lacheau, it was worse: an electric madness that turned the room upside down. Behind this perfectly orchestrated chaos, a real challenge: reinventing a myth from comics and popular imagination without remaking Shabbat. Offering an ambitious family adventure, and proving that Marsupilami can still surprise French cinema. We spoke to these two humor specialists.

Return to Marsupilamithirteen years after Alain Chabat’s film, it was a huge risk. Why go there?
Philippe Lacheau: Because it’s a childhood dream. I’m a fan of Franquin, I absolutely wanted to touch this character. But impossible to make a sequel or a remake: Alain made HIS film, very comic book, very cartoon. We had to find our ground.

Jamel Debbouze: And this terrain is the family film. Fifi wanted real entertainment for everyone, from 7 to 77 years old. A popular, clear, bright film. I told him from the start: no problem! And that’s what appealed to me: we weren’t there to repeat the first, but to offer another adventure.

Concretely, how do you find “your” Marsupilami?
PL: Starting from scratch. We redesigned everything: the gait, the expressions, the way the tail moves. The animal had to be funny, but believable in a real world. We worked like crazy on his behavior: he is curious, clever, but not magical. He had to remain an animal before becoming a gag.

JD: And Philippe is a detail psychopath. I saw him spend twenty minutes adjusting half a tail movement (laughs). But he is right: Marsu is not a mascot, it is a character. If you don’t believe it, the film falls apart.

The film strays a lot from the Chabat style. Was it a constraint or a necessity?
PL: An absolute necessity. Alain is doing Alain, no one can steal that from him. We went towards a great parody of adventure, almost a tribute to AND : an extraordinary animal that arrives in reality and turns everything upside down.

JD: I bridge the two worlds a bit. Spectators arrive with a very strong memory of the 2012 film. Ours reassures them – yes, there is indeed a Marsupilami – but takes them elsewhere. Two different proposals, two different countries. And I am the passport.

Philippe, you also had to review your style: no bad words, no trash…
PL: Yes, it was a real challenge. We wanted a family comedy without ever boring the adults. Suddenly, we moved the cursor: more situations, more visuals, less irony. This requires much more precise writing.

And how do we manage Jamel Debbouze in such a framework?
PL: We give him real comic situations. Not just “come on, do your act”. Jamel needs a place to play. When the system is solid, it brings its madness, its ruptures, its ideas.
JD: Yes, I like when the scene is already funny without me. The rest is a bonus. With Marsu in your hands, it’s simple: you play true, and he does the rest (laughs).

The Marsupilami is a cult character. Were you afraid of damaging a myth?
PL: All the time! We were walking on eggshells. Comics are sacred, and so is the universe. We worked with hardcore fans, passionate animators. Every change had to make sense.

In the end, what was your ambition?
PL: Offering an adventure for the general public that makes people laugh and dream. Neither pastiche nor repetition: our version of the myth.
JD: And allow people to find a creature they love, but from another angle. As if the Marsupilami really lived among us.

And so, the Marsu… what is it like?
JD: He’s so cute. And he runs faster than Philippe.
PL: (laughs) He plays better than both of us combined. And it requires a lot fewer shots.

Official synopsis: To save his job, David agrees to a lousy plan: bring back a mysterious package from South America. He finds himself on board a cruise with his ex Tess, his son Léo, and his colleague Stéphane, as stupid as he is clumsy, whom David uses to transport the package for him. Everything goes wrong when the latter accidentally opens it: an adorable baby Marsupilami appears and the trip turns into chaos!

Released in theaters on February 4